Thermoregulation in Animals

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LAST REVIEWED: 06 May 2016

LAST MODIFIED: 23 May 2012

DOI: 10.1093/obo/9780199830060-0007

Introduction

Thermoregulation includes all phenomena in which an organism maintains a mean or variance of body temperature that deviates from a null expectation, defined by random use of thermal microclimates and passive exchange of heat with the environment. Early studies of thermoregulation focused on certain taxa that exhibit striking physiological or behavioral strategies, such as endothermic vertebrates and desert lizards. Subsequent research has shown that most organisms thermoregulate to some degree, although thermoregulatory strategies vary greatly among taxa. In the late 1970s and the 1980s, researchers not only continued to study patterns and mechanisms of thermoregulation, they also began to study the evolutionary factors that influence capacities for and strategies of thermoregulation. This period coincided with the appearance of a new discipline, evolutionary physiology, which was a natural outgrowth of ecological physiology (or physiological ecology). From this period to the present day, studies of thermoregulation have driven much of the conceptual development within ecological and evolutionary physiology, thereby strengthening our general understanding of regulatory behavior.

Chapter 4 reviews ecological and evolutionary aspects of thermoregulation; other chapters cover specialized topics such as the coevolution of thermoregulation and thermal sensitivity, the use of game theory to understand thermoregulatory behavior, and the impacts of climate change on thermoregulatory strategies.

Although this chapter focuses on reptiles, and often lizards, the concepts that Huey discusses have been generalized to many other ectotherms. This chapter lays out many interesting questions and hypotheses and is still a worthwhile read decades after its publication.